Prison is a State of Mind…

While comfortably seated in the back seat of Coach Miss B’s Honda, I am hooked in to a temporary internet connection to write about our recent experience at California Corrections Women’s Facility where we worked with more than 100 women who are desperately seeking the tools they can use to make positive decisions in their lives. This was yet another successful GOGI workshop, brought into reality by Coach Jennie Curtis who works with the GOGI women at that prison. The goal of the workshop was to reinforce the teaching of how to use the Twelve Tools of GOGI for positive decision making.

I am curious. Why must we wait until we hit bottom, we land in jail, we end up bankrupt, or we find ourselves divorced before we aggressively seek the tools for positive change? I have no answers here, other than human nature tends to focus on pleasure. Oftentimes change, real change, is perceived as hard work. As Coach Miss B and Coach Amy and I worked with the 100 + incarcerated women of CCWF yesterday, however, the change process was fun, and playful. The women were tasked with the goal of teaching the Twelve Tools of GOGI through dance, song, poetry or any other means which would entertain and be fun. At the end of our time together they had coordinated a talent show that rivaled anyone on AMERICA’S GOT TALENT. In a series of skits and songs and participatory games, The Twelve Tools of GOGI were learned and reinforced among the women. My favorite was possibly the song. It was a beautiful testament to the value of the human soul. The song, with the lyrics “We are GOGI, women of integrity. Inner freedom is our goal, GOGI 4 Life!” was sung in a round with 100 beautiful voices ringing out like the voice of angels.

Coach Miss B is minding the speed limit of 60 MPH as we pass the prison-populated small towns of this Central California valley area. Coach Amy is napping. I am, as usual, taking every possible opportunity to share my world of GOGI with the world.

I have witnessed the fact that change happens, even in those who society feels are unchangeable. Maybe, someday, we humans won’t wait till the bottom falls out of our life before we embrace the opportunity to make lasting change a fun-filled experience. That would be my hope; that The Twelve Tools of GOGI are a playful addition to the academic requirements of all school children in the US, empowering individuals with critical tools for positive decision making long before the first bad decision sucks them into the rabbit hole from which they must struggle so desperately to escape.